regex/v4/perl_matcher_non_recursive.hpp in the Boost regex library (aka Boost.Regex) in Boost 1.33 and 1.34 allows context-dependent attackers to cause a denial of service (failed assertion and crash) via an invalid regular expression.

From Red Hat Security Advisory 2012:0305 :

Updated boost packages that fix two security issues and two bugs are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this update as having low security impact. Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base scores, which give detailed severity ratings, are available for each vulnerability from the CVE links in the References section.

The boost packages provide free, peer-reviewed, portable C++ source libraries with emphasis on libraries which work well with the C++ Standard Library.

Invalid pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash or, potentially, execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user running the application. (CVE-2008-0171)

NULL pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash. (CVE-2008-0172)

Red Hat would like to thank Will Drewry for reporting these issues.

This update also fixes the following bugs :

* Prior to this update, the construction of a regular expression object could fail when several regular expression objects were created simultaneously, such as in a multi-threaded program. With this update, the object variables have been moved from the shared memory to the stack. Now, the constructing function is thread safe. (BZ#472384)

* Prior to this update, header files in several Boost libraries contained preprocessor directives that the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) 4.4 could not handle. This update instead uses equivalent constructs that are standard C. (BZ#567722)

All users of boost are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these issues.

The boost packages provide free, peer-reviewed, portable C++ source libraries with emphasis on libraries which work well with the C++ Standard Library.

Invalid pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash or, potentially, execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user running the application. (CVE-2008-0171)

NULL pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash. (CVE-2008-0172)

This update also fixes the following bugs :

  - Prior to this update, the construction of a regular     expression object could fail when several regular     expression objects were created simultaneously, such as     in a multi-threaded program. With this update, the     object variables have been moved from the shared memory     to the stack. Now, the constructing function is thread     safe.

  - Prior to this update, header files in several Boost     libraries contained preprocessor directives that the GNU     Compiler Collection (GCC) 4.4 could not handle. This     update instead uses equivalent constructs that are     standard C.

All users of boost are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these issues.

Updated boost packages that fix two security issues and two bugs are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.

The Red Hat Security Response Team has rated this update as having low security impact. Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) base scores, which give detailed severity ratings, are available for each vulnerability from the CVE links in the References section.

The boost packages provide free, peer-reviewed, portable C++ source libraries with emphasis on libraries which work well with the C++ Standard Library.

Invalid pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash or, potentially, execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user running the application. (CVE-2008-0171)

NULL pointer dereference flaws were found in the way the Boost regular expression library processed certain, invalid expressions. An attacker able to make an application using the Boost library process a specially crafted regular expression could cause that application to crash. (CVE-2008-0172)

Red Hat would like to thank Will Drewry for reporting these issues.

This update also fixes the following bugs :

* Prior to this update, the construction of a regular expression object could fail when several regular expression objects were created simultaneously, such as in a multi-threaded program. With this update, the object variables have been moved from the shared memory to the stack. Now, the constructing function is thread safe. (BZ#472384)

* Prior to this update, header files in several Boost libraries contained preprocessor directives that the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) 4.4 could not handle. This update instead uses equivalent constructs that are standard C. (BZ#567722)

All users of boost are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these issues.

Tavis Ormandy and Will Drewry found that the bost library did not properly perform input validation on regular expressions. An attacker could exploit this by sening a specially crafted regular expression to an application linked against boost and cause a denial of service via an application crash.

The updated packages have been patched to correct this issue.

Certain regular expressions could cause the boost library to crash.
(CVE-2008-0171 / CVE-2008-0172)

Certain regular expressions could cause the boost library to crash (CVE-2008-0171, CVE-2008-0172).

- Wed Jan 16 2008 Petr Machata <pmachata at redhat.com>     1.34.1-7

    - Fixes for boost.regex (rev 42674).

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory. Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.

The remote host is affected by the vulnerability described in GLSA-200802-08 (Boost: Denial of Service)

    Tavis Ormandy and Will Drewry from the Google Security Team reported a     failed assertion in file regex/v4/perl_matcher_non_recursive.hpp     (CVE-2008-0171) and a NULL pointer dereference in function     get_repeat_type() file basic_regex_creator.hpp (CVE-2008-0172) when     processing regular expressions.
  Impact :

    A remote attacker could provide specially crafted regular expressions     to an application using Boost, resulting in a crash.
  Workaround :

    There is no known workaround at this time.

- Wed Jan 16 2008 Petr Machata <pmachata at redhat.com> -     1.33.1-15

    - Fixes for boost.regex.

    - Mon Nov 19 2007 Petr Machata <pmachata at redhat.com>
      - 1.33.1-14

    - Apply/testsuite ambiguous option patch from James       Philbin

    - Resolves: #369581

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory. Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.

Will Drewry and Tavis Ormandy discovered that the boost library did not properly perform input validation on regular expressions. An attacker could send a specially crafted regular expression to an application linked against boost and cause a denial of service via application crash.

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Ubuntu security advisory. Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
68476	Oracle Linux 5 : boost (ELSA-2012-0305)	Nessus	Oracle Linux Local Security Checks	medium
61256	Scientific Linux Security Update : boost on SL5.x i386/x86_64 (20120221)	Nessus	Scientific Linux Local Security Checks	medium
58059	RHEL 5 : boost (RHSA-2012:0305)	Nessus	Red Hat Local Security Checks	medium
37818	Mandriva Linux Security Advisory : boost (MDVSA-2008:032)	Nessus	Mandriva Local Security Checks	medium
31452	SuSE 10 Security Update : boost (ZYPP Patch Number 4978)	Nessus	SuSE Local Security Checks	medium
31451	openSUSE 10 Security Update : boost (boost-4946)	Nessus	SuSE Local Security Checks	medium
31427	Fedora 8 : boost-1.34.1-7.fc8 (2008-0754)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	medium
31110	GLSA-200802-08 : Boost: Denial of Service	Nessus	Gentoo Local Security Checks	medium
30078	Fedora 7 : boost-1.33.1-15.fc7 (2008-0880)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	medium
30018	Ubuntu 6.06 LTS / 6.10 / 7.04 / 7.10 : boost vulnerabilities (USN-570-1)	Nessus	Ubuntu Local Security Checks	medium

Detections

Analytics

CVE-2008-0171

high

Tenable Plugins

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium

medium